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Education
12.05.2014

Five years of the media portal – The source for stimulating and varied lessons

The media portal of Siemens Stiftung was launched in May 2009 with around 600 teaching materials for primary and secondary schools. Education experts can now choose from a broad range of more than 4,800 media. The contents have been continuously updated and expanded over the past five years, with new topics and applications being added. One thing has not changed: the standards of quality of the media, which are geared toward curricula and education plans and support competency-based, action-oriented learning. Now is time for a short stocktake.

A look at the figures illustrates the media portal's success. Launched with 600 media in German, it now has more than around 4,800 media in German, English and Spanish. Teachers from all types of school can find up-to-date, quality-assured content to supplement conventional teaching materials online and free of charge. The portal now has more than 20,000 registered users from 100 countries and grew by 51 percent in fiscal year 2012/2013 alone. With just a few clicks of the mouse, educators, instructors and university lecturers can access a large range of topics with mostly a scientific and technical content that has been steadily expanded and kept updated over the past five years. The media portal has also moved with the times as regards media formats: Platform-independent, interactive whiteboard content has been developed for whiteboards or beamers, numerous media promote modern teaching and learning methods such as group work or role playing, and experimentation instructions for experiments motivate children and young peoplesters to discover and learn things on their own.

The media have been created by educational experts and are in great demand thanks to their quality: Teachers in seven German federal states can currently find the materials in the portfolio of their media centers. Bilateral cooperation between Siemens Stiftung and the federal states enables that.

Five years of the media portal are a reason to celebrate, but also a spur to offer something new. With its greater range of open educational resources, Siemens Stiftung is supporting the demand for easy access to free teaching materials that can be tailored to needs. First worksheets which teachers can edit and so customize are already online.